


Splinters

by LittleLightLittleFire



Category: Being Human (UK), The Almighty Johnsons
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-19
Updated: 2017-03-19
Packaged: 2018-10-07 21:35:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,842
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10369956
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleLightLittleFire/pseuds/LittleLightLittleFire
Summary: Tormented by things he can't remember, Mitchell feels like his life is falling apart. Desperate, he prays. And the gods, they listen.A prize for Lakritzwolf for the WinterFRE





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lakritzwolf](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lakritzwolf/gifts).



Mitchell awoke with a start. Cold with sweat and trembling, he took several deep breaths, trying to calm his pounding heart. He'd woken the same way every morning for the last six months; drenched and panicky with the horrible, horrible feeling that _something_  was missing. What, he couldn't remember. A phantom limb that he had no recollection of ever having or losing.

He stumbled to the bathroom and splashed his face with cold water from the tap. He look up and felt the same jolt of surprise he felt every morning. Stupid, really. Of course it would be his face staring back in the mirror. Who else's would it be?

He put it down to his mind playing tricks; some residual panic from the dreams he couldn't recall.

Mitchell sighed and his reflection sighed with him. Two day stubble and dark circles the size of bruises under his eyes really set off the whole 'tortured soul' vibe he seemed to be inhabiting at the moment.

"Mate, you look _gorgeous,"_ he told himself sardonically.

At least it was Sunday.

Padding through to the kitchen, he made himself a massive pot of coffee and then flopped onto the sofa. Sunday morning TV in Auckland was much the same as it had been in Bristol and, for vegetating for a few hours, there was nothing better. He hated weekends these days. At least at work, there was always something to distract him from the after-effects of the nightmares. At home, he just marinated in it.

Eventually, he found some Laurel and Hardy reruns, watched those and forgot, for a brief moment, feeling so fucking miserable. When they had finished, he couldn't find the energy to go channel-surfing for something else to watch, so he turned off the TV and lay back on the sofa, staring upwards.

"Why do I feel like this?" he asked of the ceiling. "If there's anyone up there listening, please help me out. I don't know how much longer I can deal with this. This feeling, it's eating me up from the inside and it's killing me. Whatever I've lost, I want it back. I want it back, d'you hear? I want it back. _Please,"_  he whispered. "Please."

Mitchell wasn't exactly expecting the Holy Host to materialise in his apartment upon request, bearing a box with his name on it and containing _it -_ whatever _it_ was _._ Some recognition he'd been heard would have been fucking nice, though.

" _Fine._  Fuck you, I'm going for a walk."

Yanking on his coat and boots, he left the flat, slamming the door petulantly. And to cap it all off, it was raining. He scowled darkly at the weather, as though it was one more personal insult in a long list of many.

 

When Mitchell returned from his walk, anger now dampened to resignation and exhaustion, a man was lurking by the front door of his building. The man's eyes lit up in recognition as he saw Mitchell approach, and Mitchell assumed he was waiting for him.

"You alright there?" he called.

"Yis," replied the man. "My brother sent me... Well, he didn't exactly _send_ me so much as I came to talk to you on his behalf. He doesn't know I'm here."

"And who's your brother?"

"Anders. His name is Anders."

Mitchell narrowed his eyes suspiciously. "I don't know anyone called Anders."

"No, I don't expect you do," said the man with a sigh. "Can I come in? This may take a while to explain and it's not really a pavement conversation."

"Sure...Sorry, what was your name?"

"Ty."

"Right. Mitchell," he replied, sticking his hand out for Ty to shake. "But I guess you already knew that."

Unlocking the front door, Mitchell missed the "You have no idea" that Ty muttered under his breath.

 

Mitchell made himself and his unexpected visitor a cup of coffee and the pair sat on Mitchell's battered old sofa. After a couple of minutes of awkward small talk and nervous fidgeting, Ty finally got to the point.

"There's no easy way to say this that isn't going to sound mental, so I'm just going to get it all out at once.

"Up until six months ago, me, Anders and the rest of our fucked up family were the living incarnations of the Norse gods. I was Hodr, god of all things cold and dark - yay, Hodr - and Anders was Bragi. God of poetry and talking bullshit. Our youngest brother, Axl, was Odin. And when Odin found his Frigg, the god part of us returned to Asgard and left us, the vessels, here. Which is why you have no idea who I am. Or who Anders is."

"Yeah, right. You're having a fucking laugh," said Mitchell with an incredulous smirk.

"No," said Ty earnestly. "I'm really not. We became mortal and you forgot all the god shit and, apparently, all the other supernatural shit as well. Otherwise I think this conversation would be going much better than it is currently."

Mitchell shifted uncomfortably; this whole situation was starting to freak him out.

"What supernatural shit? What the fuck are you talking about?"

"You used to be a vampire," answered Ty. "You were turned during the First World War by a guy named Herrick. When you were in England, you lived with a ghost called Annie and a couple of werewolves named George and Nina. You ran away here after the other vampires tried to start a revolution. You were worried they would try and turn you bad again. Anders cut a branch from Yggdrasil-"

"Yggdra-what?"

"Yggdrasil. The World Tree. The Tree of Life, whatever you want to call it. We staked you with a splinter of it and you became human again..."

Unconsciously, Mitchell rubbed his chest. He'd been wondering where the small, red scar above his heart had come from. It was definitely big enough that he _should_ have remembered when he got it.

"No. _No._ This is insane. Get out of my flat!"

Ty stood but kept talking.

"Something's not right, is it? You keep feeling like you've forgotten something huge and massive, and it's so big that there's an emptiness inside that nothing in the world can fill. You and Anders were lovers. Bone-deep, soul-fracturing kind of love. You pretty much orbited each other from the day you met. After Bragi left, Anders decided to let you go because he said trying to rebuild what you had would hurt too much. But I had to try. He's a dick, but he's my brother and you were the best thing to ever happen to him."

Mitchell gazed up at Ty, struck, for once in his life, entirely dumb.

"Here, take this," said Ty, handing Mitchell a couple of pieces of paper. "It might jog your memory."

Ty left and Mitchell remained motionless on his couch for a good long while.

Slowly, like they might turn and attack, he unfolded the papers that Ty had given him.

The first looked like it had been printed off an ancestry website. It was a picture of a man in a soldier's uniform, who bore a creepily uncanny resemblance to Mitchell himself. The caption under the picture simply read: ' _John Mitchell. 1895-1916. Died in combat, Flanders, Belgium.'_  


It sent a chill down Mitchell's spine and every instinct told him to stop reading and run, but he pressed on.

Next was a photo of a tall, bespectacled man in front of a ridiculously pink house. The house he had rented in Bristol. And the man, Mitchell had no idea who he was, and yet...

" _George_ ," he whispered. Ty had said George was a werewolf, but Mitchell couldn't imagine anyone _less_ lupine. "We used to watch the Real Hustle together," said Mitchell and knew instantly it was true.

The final picture was of a blond man in a suit, laughing and gazing at a point in the picture where it looked like there should have been someone else but they'd been photoshopped out.

"Our image can't be captured..." he muttered.

And Mitchell started to _remember_. Fragments, splinters of his old life came flooding back in a rush that made his heart hurt and his head spin. All the things he had done to feed the monster within; all the people he had killed. Dying in the snow and the taste of blood. Years of murder, death and regret. 

Then there had been Josie. George and Annie. He had loved them and that had, in a way, redeemed him. He had learned what it was to be human again. But the vampire had gone now, dying in burning, unimaginable pain, the memory of which made his scar itch. He had been freed.

And then there was Anders. He _knew_ the man in the picture. His laugh, his voice, his smell. Coffee: black, two sugars. Drank his vodka neat. Kept goldfish, named after his favourite poets. He'd threatened to force-feed Mitchell garlic if he uttered that to another soul. He liked Sylvia Plath and T.S. Eliot and thought the Romantic poets were a bunch of maudlin arseholes. He borrowed books from the library because keeping a bookcase would make him look like a nerd. 

How could Mitchell have forgotten? That vain, annoying, sarcastic twat that Mitchell had  _loved_  with every atom. Still loved, it was becoming rapidly apparent. 

Mitchell didn't even need to think about what to do next and within half an hour, he was frantically buzzing the doorbell of Anders' flat. 

The door opened and Anders just stood and stared. Before he could regain his wits, Mitchell had stepped forward and kissed him. It was sweet and familiar and the intensity of it left them both breathless. Anders still tasted the same, still felt the same, still kissed the same. The broken pieces of Mitchell, the wound that Anders' absence had left, started to heal. 

Mitchell pulled away and examined the man in front of him. Anders was disheveled, hungover, pale and gaunt. 

"You look like shit," said Mitchell.

"Oh, that's nice! It's been six months, and that's the first thing you say?"

"Why didn't you come and _find me_?"

Anders didn't answered and began to study his toes. Closing himself off because the conversation was too difficult. But Mitchell knew how to wrangle Anders. Wrapping his arms around him, Mitchell buried his nose into Anders' hair. Anders paused for a moment, then flung his arms around Mitchell's waist and clung to him as though his life depended on it.

"You didn't love me anymore," Anders mumbled into Mitchell's shoulder. "You didn't even know who I was. I saw what Ty went through with Dawn and I _couldn't._ "

"I did love you. I still love you, you idiot. Even when I couldn't remember, there was a part of me that knew something - some _one_  was missing. The last six months have been hell."

"It shows," said Anders, trying and failing to hide his sniffle. Mitchell chuckled and squeezed him extra-tight. 

"Yep. Still a twat," Mitchell said and, for once, Anders did not disagree. 

**Author's Note:**

> Oh Anders, you muppet. 
> 
> Hope you guys enjoyed this! Thanks for reading, kudosing and commenting.


End file.
